Performance students bring fight for women’s suffrage to life
Wednesday 7 March 2018
STUDENTS from the University of Salford will bring the struggle for universal suffrage to life with a series of performances.
Performance students will play suffrage campaigners from the early 1900s throughout the Drama Of The Suffrage Movement event, held at the People’s History Museum following International Women’s Day.
They will perform speeches given by women’s suffrage campaigners from the era, as well as songs from the suffrage movement such as Rise Up Women, The March Of The Women and Woman This And Woman That.
The performers will interact with visitors throughout the event on Friday 9 and Saturday 10 March to help bring to light some of the less well known campaigners who fought for women to be given the right to vote.
Power of new media forms
Clare Neylon, MA Programme Leader for Scriptwriting for Television and Radio at the University of Salford, will also talk about how suffrage campaigners used the power of new media forms of the time – such as moving pictures and newsreel cameras – to create spectacles promoting their cause.
Other experts helping bring the suffrage movement to life during the event include historians Elizabeth Crawford from Royal Holloway, leading suffrage researcher Naomi Paxton and Katharine Cockin from the University of Essex who will discuss the art of suffrage theatre, the Actresses’ Franchise League and the use of suffrage processions.
This is an important event, giving people an insight into what women were up against at the time and uncovering some of the less well-known suffrage campaigners.
Clare Neylon said: “We’ve just seen the 100th anniversary of some women being given the right to vote, and as we mark International Women’s Day on Friday this event aims to showcase how drama, media and spectacle were used in the fight for votes for women.
“This is an important event, giving people an insight into what women were up against at the time and uncovering some of the less well-known suffrage campaigners. It’s a wonderful opportunity for our students to have been involved in this.”
Go here for more information about the event.
